Russia Unveils Long Endurance Drone

The Russian Altius-U medium altitude long endurance (MALE) drone made its debut flight today.

The Russian Defence Ministry has posted a video of the maiden flight of a 6-tonne Altius-U drone, capable of being in the air for more than 24 hours.

A 1 minute and 3 second video was posted on the ministry's YouTube channel. The video shows the drone's flight and manoeuvres in the sky, as well as landing.

The Altius-U  was created as a result of the development and testing of a number of prototypes. The flight took place for 32 minutes at an altitude of up to 800 metres in fully automatic mode at one of the test aerodromes. All systems of the complex worked properly, the Ministry of Defence noted.

The drone is capable of performing an entire spectrum of reconnaissance missions using optical, radio engineering and radar and can stay in the air for more than 24 hours.

After lagging behind for years, Russia is trying to catch up on drone technology. In the recent past it has revealed a number of drones under development – from attack to reconnaissance.